Qualitative analysis of advanced pharmacy practice experience goals

Area of Science:

• Pharmacy Education
• Health Professions Education
• Pharmacist Training

Background:

• Advanced Pharmacy Practice Experiences (APPEs) are crucial for developing clinical skills.
• Understanding student goal-setting provides insight into perceived learning needs.
• Entrustable Professional Activities (EPAs) define core competencies for pharmacists.

Purpose of the Study:

• To identify activities students wish to pursue during APPEs.
• To analyze student goal-setting alignment with core EPAs.
• To understand how student aspirations match professional competency requirements.

Main Methods:

• Qualitative analysis of student SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic/Relevant, Time-bound) goals.
• Inductive thematic analysis of goal data.
• Crosswalk creation between identified themes and core EPAs.

Main Results:

• 1690 SMART goals from 79 students were categorized into 22 themes.
• Top themes included: Assess/Recommend Therapy (19%), Patient Communication (15.4%), Foundational Knowledge (12.4%).
• The Patient Care Provider EPA domain was most common (46.4%), while others like Population Health Promoter were less frequent.

Conclusions:

• Student goals largely align with direct patient care, a core focus of pharmacy.
• Certain EPAs were infrequently cited, suggesting potential underemphasis on these skills in student goal setting.
• This may indicate a need to better integrate all core competencies into APPE goal development.